Unholy Trinity: Unholy Trinity of the Moon by Cole Todd
Our church worships at the altar of the Unholy Trinity. Its gospels are delivered as a trio of dark drabbles, linked so that Three become One. All hail the power of the Three.
Blood Moon
Every child knows the Moon Rules, and how to keep safe. The problem was the moon wasn’t playing by the rules any more.
Blood Moon always brings conflict; the Border Wars started like clockwork every seven years under its crimson tint. Stay inside and speak to no-one, because whoever you see will want to kill you by night’s end. But now Blood Moon brought literal blood – great gouts of it fell from the sky like rain, stinking in the fields and coating the streets. Blood brought rats, rats brought plague, and the plague brought mass graves, deep as sea caves.
Super Moon
Everyone knows Super Moon brings super tides. Tsunamis, flooding, everyone within a hundred miles of the coast just packs up and leaves. Better than staying and drowning in the white-washed night.
But this year Super Moon grew so big it flood-lit the whole sky; no-one could sleep for a month with that celestial searchlight glaring through brick and stone, melting glass and burning skin. Its unforgiving light showed every sin thought secret, worming their way to the surface of your loved ones’ faces. A fifth of the population went blind from the constant glare, and they were the lucky ones.
Black Hole Moon
Black Hole Moon is a great dark ring covering a third of the sky, its pale eye shining in the centre. Scientists used to think it was caused by ice crystals in the upper atmosphere; until the moon blinked, and there was one less star in the sky. Every year we lost light.
Until this year, when the black hole grew bigger, and the moon shrank and shrank; then it disappeared entirely. We prayed to the gods we had given up on, for the moon never to return.
Today scientists said it won’t: for the black hole is still growing…
Cole Todd
Cole Todd worked as a therapist and counselling supervisor before becoming disabled with ME-CFS. She used this life change as an opportunity to pursue her passion for stories, and now writes flash fiction, short stories, novels and self-help articles about identities and relationships. She is also composing a workshop to help others utilise writing as a way to improve their physical and mental wellbeing. Cole loves crafts and walking in the Scottish countryside, which often inspires her creative work.
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Stephanie Ellis writes dark speculative prose and poetry and has been published in a variety of magazines and anthologies. Her longer work includes the folk horror novels, The Five Turns of the Wheel, Reborn, and The Woodcutter, and the novellas, Bottled and Paused (all via Brigids Gate Press). Her dark poetry has been published in her collections Lilith Rising (co-authored with Shane Douglas Keene), Foundlings (co-authored with Cindy O’Quinn) and Metallurgy, as well as the HWA Poetry Showcase Volumes VI, VII, VIII, and IX and Black Spot Books Under Her Skin. She can be found supporting indie authors at HorrorTree.com via the weekly Indie Bookshelf Releases. She can be found at https://stephanieellis.org and on Blue Sky as stephellis.bsky.social.
